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The United States Institute of Peace (USIP) was established by Congress in 1984 as an independent, federally-funded national security institution devoted to the nonviolent prevention and mitigation of deadly conflict abroad.

The Economics of Peace

By:

Tara Sonenshine and Lawrence Woocher

It’s all about numbers these days--costs, savings, debt, deficit and spending. That’s good news for those who work in the field of international peacebuilding and conflict prevention. We’re the best bargain in town.

March 1, 2011

It’s all about numbers these days--costs, savings, debt, deficit and spending.

That’s good news for those who work in the field of international peacebuilding and conflict prevention. We’re the best bargain in town.

The total national and regional cost of a single civil war is more than $64 billion, according to Paul Collier, noted expert and author.

Violent conflicts are estimated to incur billions of dollars of costs for the United States and the countries in which they occur. Nearly $5 billion was spent by the international community on Rwanda and Haiti, each, in the 1990s. The Bosnian conflict cost at least 10 times as much. (see Brown & Rosencrance, 1999). For the United States alone, according to economist Joe Stiglitz, the Iraq war will cost America $3 trillion or more.

Enter peacebuilding. For very low costs and little or no loss of life, conflict prevention can save billions of dollars.

For the equivalent of about $25,000, USIP brought together the tribal leaders of that Iraqi region for three days of serious conflict negotiation work. The result was, according to General David Petraeus, “a striking success story.” It saved lives and money and became a model for future cost efficient ways to prevent loss of life and treasure. Says Petraeus, “USIP’s continuing reconciliation efforts at the community level, especially in Diyala and Ninewa, as well as at the national level in Baghdad, hold great promise for the future.”

The moral of the story is prevention. According to the Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict—prevention works. “In every case we examined…conflict prevention actually cost or would have cost the international community much less than the conflicts themselves. In some cases, the cost difference is truly staggering- in short, conflict prevention is cost effective.”

America can no longer afford to sit on the sidelines and watch conflicts erupt. Nor can we afford not to invest in conflict prevention. The savings of stopping violence around the world before it starts are too great and too urgent.

Related Event

Nigeria’s March 28 election and the aftermath constitute a critical test for Nigeria’s democratic development and stability as the country struggles against the Boko Haram insurgency. On April 2, the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) hosts an interactive live-streamed discussion with experts including USIP Senior Advisor Ambassador Johnnie Carson, who will just have returned from co-leading an international election observation mission to Nigeria.

Iraq faces an array of obstacles this year, as the government of Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi struggles to unify competing factions and confronts the brutal militants of the so-called “Islamic State” militarily. Abadi must navigate significant economic challenges and massive displacements of citizens because of the fighting, while struggling to meet terms set out by the country’s Kurdish Regional Government in the north and the Sunni coalition who joined his government in Baghdad.

In the midst of a political shift where power is moving from central institutions to smaller, more distributed units in the international system, the approaches to and methodologies for peacemaking are changing. "Managing Conflict in a World Adrift" provides a sobering panorama of contemporary conflict, along with innovative thinking about how to respond now that new forces and dynamics are at play.

The devastation wrought by the past year’s renewed conflict in Iraq -- and equally by the long slog to dislodge the Islamic State -- can be captured in the frame of a teenage boy. The new fighting atop a decade of war after the 2003 U.S. invasion brings not only further physical damage, but a dangerous breakdown of the social fabric.

Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its military operations in Eastern Ukraine have overturned the post–Cold War norms that had provided stability and development for the former Soviet countries bordering Russia. As neighboring countries assess their own security situation based on Russia’s aggressive practices in Ukraine and the West’s response, they are actively testing the new contours of Russian and Western engagement, regional alliances and relationships, and regional conflict dynamics.

New U.N. operations in the Sahel present unprecedented challenges for U.N. peacekeeping. They involve the United Nations directly in the struggle against transnational Islamist terrorism, weapons proliferation, and illicit trafficking by international organized crime. The United Nations must operate in countries with harsh terrain, vast expanses, poor communications, and porous borders. In response, the Security Council adopted more robust mandates based on the peace enforcement provisions of the U.N. Charter. In Mali, the United Nations joined the African Union, the European Union, and France, whose forces conduct combat operations, while the United Nations used helicopter gunships and armed police units to protect civilians. In the Central African Republic, U.N. Police are authorized to control violence and arrest offenders. For the United States, there is new interest in U.N. peacekeeping and its importance to U.S. national security interests.